We're driving to California in three days and I just spent the afternoon baking snacks for the road trip. Cooling now are granola bars from Good Eats' "Power Trip" episode. Next time I'm going to see if I can make this less expensive (and drop the butter for margarine to make it vegan) but I wanted to do the math to see how expensive my endeavor was. (And I'll comment on the taste later... once I've had a chance to taste a bar.)
| Amount | Ingredient | Cost |
| 8 oz | rolled oats | $0.25 |
| 1.5 oz | raw sunflower seeds | $0.26 |
| 3 oz | sliced almonds | $1.83 |
| 1.5 oz | wheat germ | $0.83 |
| 6 oz | honey | $1.25 |
| 1.75 oz | dark brown sugar | $0.22 |
| 1.25 oz | unsalted butter | $0.15 |
| 2 tsp | vanilla extract | $0.60 |
| 1/2 tsp | salt | $0.00 |
| 6.5 oz | dried fruit* | $3.25 |
For a total of $8.64
*I used half apricot, a quarter cherries, and a quarter blueberries.
The best I can do in describing the taste of these granola bars is "a better tasting Quaker Chewey Granola bars and without the chemical aftertaste." So I'll use that as my comparison:
The recipe yielded 29 oz of granola bars, the equivalent of 34 and a half Quaker Chewey Granola Bars, which would clock in at $8.11 over at Amazon. So... not thrifty today. I saved -6.5%.
On my next pass I'll try replacing the dried fruit with rasins, which should bring me close to the taste of Quaker's bars while also saving me $2.08 for the batch. That would be 19% savings, putting it into the "thrifty" category.
